"The seasons of the earth and the seasons of life start to blend and memories come back when the daylight fades off, with the smell of a campfire, or the first rain shower after months of falling snow. What were we doing the last time this happened?"

I love the way my house hums in the morning when everyone is gone except me, the machines take over the messes, and I retreat into my head, cup of coffee in hand, and peace abounds. This is something I have not experienced to its fullest in several months, but today, as the kids and the husband return to the structure of the educational environment, I return to a place in time that is all my own…for at least a few hours each day.

On the farm we live life by the seasons. It helps that our kids are still young, and Chris works on a collegiate schedule, but even if that wasn’t the case, the land is ruled by mother nature, and she has a very strict schedule. This is so different than when we lived in Vegas and the only changes we saw were the ability to get into the car without scorching our hands on the steering wheel in the summer, and when we moved from having no way of removing enough clothing to be cool, to needing a light sweater in the winter…when it got sometimes below 50 degrees. Despite the temperature, the landscape remained the same, I got in my car each morning and went to work, only to return each afternoon. We chased life day in and day out, but never seemed to catch it. Maybe it’s not the environment that has created such a switch in our lives, but the way we approach it during this new chapter.

Seasons come and go as temperatures change, green turns to gold, chicks grow into chickens, seeds turn to food. They also change as kids turn into teenagers, romance turns to commitment, and parents become grandparents. The seasons of the earth and the seasons of life start to blend and memories come back when the daylight fades off, with the smell of a campfire, or the first rain shower after months of falling snow. What were we doing the last time this happened? Ah, yes, I was holding a cup of coffee looking out the window at a little gray cat side-stepping melting piles of ice to climb a tree, listening to the rain dropping onto thawing ground. The seasons.

At the changing of the earth it’s easy to look back in wonder at the pace that time flies by. I can hardly believe after months of waiting for summer to arrive, it is already coming to an end. From the first planting of seeds, we are now harvesting an abundance of food from our land. From those first days of summer vacation wondering how to best teach the kids the lessons of life at home versus the structure of the classroom, to seeing them in the garden, the chicken coop, or the woods, working, sweating, and finding joy (most of the time) in our homestead. The seasons.

Little Black Hen

King Cody

For me, I sneak through summer by the threads of my britches trying to balance life as a homemaker, mother, wife, farmer, and crafter. In my zone in the kitchen with a to-do list half a mile long, I am interrupted with kids wanting me to play. How long is that going to be a thing? So, of course, I play. As the vegetables start piling up, Chris and I try to get creative on what to do with the ever-growing pile of cucumbers and zucchini. So I chop, shred, freeze, and bake. The ideas keep coming as our business grows, so I plan, research, test, retest, and create. The seasons.

Summer Harvest

Now we move to a time when the lack of interruption means a chance to structure a day with a little more discipline, a little more productivity. It also means more quiet time to think. Time to sit, and enjoy the life that surrounds us. Time to look around, and time to appreciate all that we have, all that we do, and the memories created with the changing of the seasons.